Bill Kistler, CEO of ICSC Europe, made a strong call for action to kickstart the retail industry’s equivalent of climate change during his closing speech at the Retail Innovation Forum in Berlin this week.
Kistler made his plea following a poll earlier in the day during which no less 80% of the 180 ICSC delegates assembled at the conference voted that the retail industry was 'too conservative to change'.
However, the conference did throw up concrete suggestions of change and new concepts for a new world order where retail floats on a sea of wifi. Mixing non-retail uses and mixing shop merchandising were debated and pop-up shops were visited. Milligan’s industry veteran Paul Hannegraaf revealed the Creative Trade concept, using remarkable physical spaces such as Victorian factories to bring together craftsmen who need to sell their products and need common services.
He energetically underlined the power of ‘olderpreneurs’ and their role in the shared economy.
Peter Todd, CEO of Portus Retail, said we have ‘way too many of the wrong retail square metres’ and pushed hard for an overhaul of investor thinking on lease structures to closer align landlords and tenants.
Significantly, few ICSC members are retailers. Redevco’s Clemens Brenninkmeijer pointed out a huge disconnect in innovative velocity - consumers change with exponential speed, forcing retailers to sprint to keep up. Retail landlords, however, are walking without urgency and many of the owners’ lending banks are standing still.
A comprehensive review of the one-day event will be published in the upcoming edition of ICSC's publication Informed.
